Tensions in Oakland over homelessness hinder solutions

A tent rests adjacent to the Lake Merritt Community Cabins site in Oakland, Calif., on Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2018. The city plans to house up to 40 homeless people in the sheds as part of it's third Community Cabins site.

Photo: Noah Berger / Special to The Chronicle

Homelessness is threatening to rupture Oakland.

On one side, city leaders and officials are scrambling to contain an intractable and complex issue that’s steeped in systemic economic disparities and historical racial inequities.

On the other side, people — homeless residents and the advocates who support them — are demanding the city government provide free or subsidized housing.

Caught in the middle are Oakland residents who just want their parks, streets and sidewalks back.

The way Oakland has done this, at times, is by clearing camps and confiscating the tents and possessions of homeless people — without providing access to alternative housing. And when you have “nothing,” your possessions and the place you rest your head at night become everything that’s worth fighting for.

In the past month, it seems, homeless people and their supporters are pushing back against being pushed around the city.

A few people have refused to vacate a private lot on Wood Street, slowing the process of turning the lot into a safe parking site for people living in vehicles. The lot was supposed to be cleared and graded by the end of November.

On Nov. 18, two working mothers moved into a vacant house on Magnolia Street in West Oakland. (Wedgewood LLC, the company that owns the property, sent the moms an eviction notice on Dec. 3.)

A week after the moms moved in, on Nov. 25, 22 people were arrested after dozens of protesters set up tents outside Oakland City Hall to protest the treatment of homeless people.

Then, at the special meeting on Dec. 4, where city staff discussed a five-year plan to address homelessness, Needa Bee, founder of the Village, an advocacy group that began as an encampment, assailed Joe DeVries, an assistant to the city administrator. She called him a “murderer.” When DeVries, who focuses on homeless policies, began to leave the council chambers, a woman attempted to stop him by grabbing his arm and saying, “You are not allowed to leave.”

Oakland City Administrator Sabrina Landreth responded to the incident by accusing the City Council members who were present of being “complicit” in the personal attack, my colleague Sarah Ravani reported.

Look, we all really need to take a deep breath, because we can’t afford to get sidetracked and lose sight of what’s really at stake here: the lives of people trying to mentally and physically survive living on the street.

I understand people are frustrated, but an attack on officials who share the goal of getting people housed is unproductive. It’s also dangerous.

“We’re in a place where people’s frustrations are so high that we are no longer able to have productive dialogue,” said Lara Tannenbaum, manager of the city’s community housing services. “We need to be in dialogue with our community members and our advocates, and if everything is so polarized, we can’t hear each other.”

Here’s why people living on the streets are upset: Homelessness in Oakland increased by 47% in the past two years, with a 68% increase in the number of unsheltered people — from 1,902 to 3,210 people. What’s more, 70% of homeless people are black when black people are less than a quarter of Oakland’s population.

Tannenbaum, who has worked on homelessness for two decades, knows the city is in a precarious position.

“No one in the city thinks the status quo is acceptable,” she said. “Nobody. Nobody.”

Oh yeah, I got distracted by the drama. Sorry, what I really wanted to talk about was Oakland’s broad and ambitious five-year plan to keep people housed, which includes the creation of affordable, extremely low income and permanent supportive housing units. The price tag is $123 million — annually.

I know, it’s a lot. But consider this: In October, the San Diego City Council approved a plan to house half of the city’s homeless population within three years and find permanent homes for thousands more in the next decade at a total cost of $1.9 billion, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Housing is a basic human right. If the government doesn’t provide affordable shelter to those who can’t secure it themselves, the cost of doing nothing in Oakland would result in the homeless population continuing to grow. I don’t know anyone who wants that.

“It is incredibly sobering,” Tannenbaum said of the cost. “There are some really hard decisions to make for the city.”

How will the city pay for the plan? That’s what we should be talking about.

“In terms of a path to housing, I didn’t see any steps within it that were going to address how to make that happen,” said Elyse Weiner, a medical social worker with patients who are unhoused or at-risk of becoming homeless. “It seemed like it was throwing out numbers without enough of a specific plan to actually work towards.”

As council members discussed the plan, I overheard a man talking about housing say, “We gon’ get it.”

Otis R. Taylor Jr. is the East Bay columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle, focusing on the people who make the region a fascinating place to live and work. A South Carolina transplant, Otis spent more than a decade at The (Columbia, S.C.) State newspaper, writing about arts, culture and entertainment. Previously, Otis was the managing editor of a tech startup. Otis is interested in reporting on issues relating to diversity and equality in the East Bay, as well as the region’s history, culture and politics. He studied English at Clemson University.